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Affordable Things To Do With Your Friends and Family This Easter

 

Over the past few years our economic conditions and cost of living has worsened with no prospects of improvement in the near future, which has caused an increase of debt in South Africa. Conversations surrounding the price of petrol and groceries have been at the top of every bread-winner’s mind, which can cause us to worry about the upcoming holidays, such as Easter. 

Easter Weekend is a time to celebrate life, growth and new beginnings, no matter your religious beliefs – you can still enjoy the chaos of egg hunts, cute bunnies and chocolates. Even with your affordability concerns, there are still meaningful ways to celebrate this holiday without breaking the bank (or in this case, eggs!). All it takes is some mindful and intentional planning, which Debt Movement provides in this blog. 

With Easter being a few days after payday, it would be a good idea to get some financial guidance about how you can manage your money efficiently, so that you do not find yourself struggling financially for the remainder of the month. 

Budget friendly activities

In ways similar to Christmas, our Easter celebrations can be whatever we want them to be, whether you’re the kind of family that hosts and has dinner together, dresses up to take cute photos and creating memories with your children or attends Easter egg hunts – it’s about the values and traditions that are important to your family, which can be done in budget friendly and inexpensive ways. 

Easter Egg Hunt

This is one of the most classic and collaborative activities that families can do together to make either the morning of Easter Eve or Easter Sunday, fun for the whole family. If you’re looking for new ways to make this activity special, try planning an Easter Egg hunt that the kids would not expect. Instead of chocolates and sweets, fill the eggs with written ‘special rewards”, resembling fortune cookies. This will save you money on buying treats and the children will be excited to find out what special rewards they have won. 

Rewards ideas: 

  • Skipping chores (washing dishes, laundry or cleaning)
  • Choose desert for dinner
  • Staying up past bed-time
  • Have a family movie night and let them choose the movie
  • Have a games night and let them choose the games

Make this activity more than just what’s inside the eggs by making how the kids find the eggs creative as well. 

You could have: 

  • Mystery egg hunt, fill the eggs with clues so the children can solve the mystery to find the egg treasure
  • Nighttime egg hunt, using a flashlight to find the clues or the egg basket.  

Bunny-hop Sack Race 

Instead of throwing out potato sacks after use, simply turn them into a fun game where each player gets a sack and has to use it to bunny hop to the finish line! If you don’t have any potato sacks, you can also use old pillow cases. 

This is an inexpensive and fun challenge that the whole family can participate in, and get some energy out of your system. Your children may want to play this game again and again! 

The winner of this challenge can receive a treat prize at the end of the challenge, giving the participants something to look forward to. 

Make a Cracker-House

This is a creative and tasty activity that is very hands-on and allows children to express themselves with food in a way that is not wasteful or heavy on your pockets. Think of this as a gingerbread house, except with crackers! All you need to make a cracker-house is crackers (ofcourse), icing and any snack related items – marshmallows, chocolates, sweets or easter eggs. 

Once your children are done building and decorating the house, they can eat their creations afterwards, which is the best part. For families with younger children, parents can help with the building part, making this activity family friendly and a good way to bond together. 

This cracker-house can also be used as a desert alternative, to cut spending on extra items for puddings or cakes. 

Bring-and-share Dinner

Did you know that hosting a family dinner doesn’t mean you have to provide all the food? 

If you are looking into having a family dinner with extended family and friends, have everyone bring a dish to share. The easiest way to do this is to make sure you have all the bases covered through meal preparations, so you know what everyone is bringing – from main meals to drinks to deserts. Discuss with your family and friends which meal they would like to bring. This is affordable because your dish would be based on what you can afford to spend on ingredients, and the entire dinner is not only dependent on you.  

It would be mindful to look out for grocery specials and deals when shopping for ingredients. You can easily find grocery store catalogues online, which can help you determine which stores have the best deals within your budget while creating your menu or meal preparations. 

We understand that it can be easy to overspend on holidays when we lose control of our finances. Holidays are a source of financial stress for those who are struggling financially or unaware of how to manage their expenses. Debt Movement has a blog which includes 5 tips to control holiday spending which can provide some insight into planning and budgeting, so that you can get through every holiday without getting into debt. 

If you are struggling with debt and thinking about entering into debt review, Debt Movement is here to offer you non-judgemental debt advice and financial guidance. Request a free call back today with our understanding and caring team.